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Brand Names in Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake http://www.diva-portal.org Postprint This is the accepted version of a paper published in Names: A Journal of Onomastics. This paper has been peer-reviewed but does not include the final publisher proof-corrections or journal pagination. Citation for the original published paper (version of record): Grimbeek, M. (2016) Wholesale Apocalypse: Brand Names in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake. Names: A Journal of Onomastics, 64(2): 88-98 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00277738.2016.1159448 Access to the published version may require subscription. N.B. When citing this work, cite the original published paper. Permanent link to this version: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kau:diva-40725 Wholesale Apocalypse: Brand Names in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake Marinette Grimbeek Karlstad University, Sweden Coinages pervade Margaret Atwood’s post-apocalyptic novel Oryx and Crake (2003). Most of the neologisms in the novel denote corporations and their products and form part of a thoroughgoing critique of consumerism. The coinages are jarringly hyperbolic and their orthography often evokes contrary connotations. However, in the thematic context of the novel, coining practices follow certain patterns and function as effective, if ambiguous, satirical tools. On one level, the practice of branding is thoroughly satirized. On another, however, the neologisms point to both the limitations and possibilities of satire when dealing with the themes addressed in the novel: commoditization, environmental damage on a planetary scale, and a vision of the imminent end of humanity itself. KEYWORDS: Margaret Atwood; satire; brand names; literature; consumerism The Version of Record of this manuscript has been published and is available in Names: A Journal of Onomastics , Vol. 64(2): 88-98. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00277738.2016.1159448 Oryx and Crake (2003), the first novel of Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy, is set in a near future in which current environmental concerns, as well as societal and biotechnological developments, have taken on decidedly dystopian dimensions. 1 This article explores the notion that Atwood’s criticism of current trends finds expression in a kind of Orwellian Newspeak, as is, for example, manifest in the seemingly incongruous brand names used in the novel. Atwood’s coinages are discussed by first briefly showing the significance of different types of naming in the novel. Next the different categories of corporate names and related coinages in Oryx and Crake are considered. These include coined names pertaining to the Internet and online gaming, and the names of bioengineering corporations and the products they develop (cosmetic procedures, foodstuffs, as well as new, spliced species). Neologisms fulfil structural, thematic, and stylistic functions in the novel, and these are exemplified in the discussion. In conclusion, the manner in which these hyperbolic coinages simultaneously highlight the limitations and possibilities of satiric coinage as means of critique is explored. Naming in Oryx and Crake Through much of the post-apocalyptic narrative of Oryx and Crake , Jimmy/Snowman, the protagonist, believes himself to be the last surviving human: his only companions are the Crakers, humanoid bioengineered beings designed as the ecofriendly replacements of humans. The apocalyptic event of the MaddAddam trilogy is a pandemic engineered to cause the demise of humanity, and to thus pave the way for the Crakers. The apocalypse forms a chasm in the narrative, a break that is underscored both onomastically, and through the tense of narration. The novel comprises two interwoven timelines: the post-apocalyptic present-tense narrative only spans a few days and is alternated with much longer sections consisting of Snowman’s flashbacks to his pre-apocalyptic life. To mark the difference between his pre- The Version of Record of this manuscript has been published and is available in Names: A Journal of Onomastics , Vol. 64(2): 88-98. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00277738.2016.1159448 and post-apocalyptic existence, Jimmy takes the name Snowman after the catastrophe, and refers throughout to his previous self in the third person. He derives “bitter pleasure” from the adoption of this “dubious label” at a time when climate change has rendered snow obsolete in North America (Atwood, 2003a: 7). At first he describes the name as a shortened form of Abominable Snowman , a figure “existing and not existing” (Atwood, 2003a: 7), and therefore an appropriate name for perhaps the last remaining human being. Much later in the novel, Snowman realizes: Maybe he’s the other kind of snowman, the grinning dope set up as a joke and pushed down as an entertainment, his pebble smile and carrot nose an invitation to mockery and abuse. Maybe that’s the real him, the last Homo sapiens —a white illusion of a man, here today, gone tomorrow, so easily shoved over, left to melt in the sun, getting thinner and thinner until he liquefies and trickles away altogether. As Snowman is doing now. (Atwood, 2003a: 224) Although he deliberately chooses a name with a (to him) clear denotation, Snowman thus comes to realize that the more conventional sense of his name is more apt in his situation, especially with the added connotation of a snowman as a type of fool. This dissonance between denotation and possible connotations is characteristic of the naming practices in the novel, and is especially prominent in relation to its treatment of brand names, as will be seen shortly. Snowman is not the only character who changes his name in this novel. Members of the MaddAddam group, for instance, adopt the names of extinct species; Oryx and Crake , the two title characters, bear such names. Amanda Payne’s reinvention of herself hinges on the rejection of her original name, Barb Jones , whereas the Crakers are playfully named after important historical figures like Abraham Lincoln , Madame Curie , and Sojourner Truth . The significance of charactonyms in Atwood’s oeuvre has usually been noted in connection with her earlier acclaimed dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale (1985). 3 While charactonyms are not my central concern here, their prominence in Atwood’s novels in general, and in Oryx and Crake in particular, illustrates the importance of names and naming in her work. The Version of Record of this manuscript has been published and is available in Names: A Journal of Onomastics , Vol. 64(2): 88-98. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00277738.2016.1159448 Many of the references to names and naming in the MaddAddam trilogy share another trait: they are explicit and reflective on a metatextual level. In Oryx and Crake , MaddAddam is an endonym used by a group of anti-corporation bioterrorists. Members of the group stay in touch through the Extinctathon game. The slogan of the game refers to naming too: “Adam named the living animals, MaddAddam names the dead ones” (Atwood, 2003a: 80). The game itself requires players to correctly guess the name of a recently extinct species by analyzing its “Phylum Class Order Family Genus Species,” and finally determining “the habitat and when last seen, and what had snuffed it” (Atwood, 2003a: 80). The palindromic name MaddAddam , with its doubled letters and internal capitalization, follows the same pattern as many of the coined brand names in the novel. In addition to conforming to the patterns of coinage used within the novel, this also suggests that Atwood plays with the notion of the commodification of literature or art as such. Both the final novel and the trilogy as a whole are entitled MaddAddam —confirming that coinage is not incidental, but integral to the trilogy. Coining Practices “Alternative universes,” as Terry Eagleton recently succinctly observed, “are really devices for embarrassing the present, as imaginary cultures are used to estrange and unsettle our own” (2015: n.p.). Oryx and Crake does exactly this. Coinage is one variety of invention, and in a sense, speculative fiction itself may be seen as an elaborate coining practice, comprising invented scenarios. In Atwood’s novel the near-future world of the text is always to be seen in relation to present concerns. Quite simply, despite its near-future setting the novel is a commentary on the historical circumstances of its origin. The reasons given in the novel for the deterioration from our world to the pre-apocalyptic setting are almost always connected to The Version of Record of this manuscript has been published and is available in Names: A Journal of Onomastics , Vol. 64(2): 88-98. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00277738.2016.1159448 an all-pervasive commercialization, vividly represented by the ubiquitous and often absurd brand names coined before the pandemic struck. Coinage is manifest on different levels in the novel: the plot unfolds in an invented, near-future world; this near-future world abounds with coined names to denote new technologies and products; and the protagonist regularly coined terms in his marketing job prior to the pandemic. In the pre-apocalyptic world of the novel, environmental destruction and climate change have taken on catastrophic proportions. This, in turn, has led to vast inequalities in society, manifest in the segregation of cities into Compounds , inhabited by the privileged, and pleeblands , where the less-advantaged “pleebs” (slang for ‘plebeians’) lead a precarious existence. Multinational corporations have become de facto governments, and individuals are consumers, rather than citizens. The pre-apocalyptic consumer culture of the novel is an extrapolation of the brand-saturated postwar American culture examined by Friedman (1991), but Atwood’s narrative is not so much marked by the inclusion of existing brand names, as by the pervasive coinage of new ones. Commercial interests trump everything else in the world of Oryx and Crake. Intellectual endeavor tends to be concentrated on profitable fields of inquiry, such as bioengineering.
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